[supercomputer to man] …talking to you is like giving birth to a leviathan through the eye of a needle -- which turns out to be possible, if the leviathan is sufficiently reduced. But then the leviathan looks like a flea. Such are my problems when I try to adapt myself to your language. As you see, the difficulty is not only that you cannot reach my heights, but also that I cannot wholly descend to you, for in descending I lose along the way what I wanted to convey.

In Gaza, children,
you learn that the sky kills
and that houses hurt.
You learn that your blanket is smoke
and breakfast is dirt.

You learn that cars do somersaults
clothes turn red,
friends become statues,
bakers don’t sell bread.

You learn that the night is a gun,
that toys burn
breath can stop,
it could be your turn.

You learn:
if they send you fire
they couldn’t guess:
not just the soldier dies -
it’s you and the rest.

Nowhere to run,
nowhere to go,
nowhere to hide
in the home you know.

You learn
that death isn’t life,
that air isn’t bread,
the land is for all.
You have the right to be
Not Dead.
You have the right to be
Not Dead.
You have the right to be
Not Dead.

The Stranger

Tell me, enigmatical man, whom do you love best, your father, your mother, your sister, or your brother?
I have neither faither, not mother, nor sister nor brother.
Your friends?
Now you use a word whose meaning I have never known.
Your country?
I do not know in what latitude it lies.
Beauty?
I could indeed love her, Goddess and Immortal.
Gold?
I hate it as you hate God.
Then, what do you love, extraordinary stranger?
I love the clouds ... the clouds that pass ... up there ... up there ... the wonderful clouds!